Liverpool vs Tottenham: Why winning ugly can propel Jurgen Klopp’s side to Premier League title

Liverpool are supercharged by the psychological elixir of a late goal. Every successful title challenge in history has needed them

Amid the joyous scenes in the Liverpool dressing room, Jurgen Klopp had a little joke to make to bring a few more laughs.

“There are 500,000 ways to win a football game,” the German told his players. “And today was rather ugly!”

It also has a unique beauty, at least for the team who scores. In truth, as Klopp admitted, there’s no sweeter way to win a game. There’s no better effect than a last-minute winner in a game where you might not have deserved the victory.

“One hundred per cent,” Klopp concurred. “We are all human beings.”

They are now human beings propelled by the psychological elixir of a goal like that. Every successful title challenge in history has had them. Every title in challenger in history has needed them, those breaks, and the brilliant effect they have.

This is why it would be churlish to dwell on another goalkeeping error that has gone in their favour, another moment of luck.

The reality is that every title winner ever has benefitted from similar strokes of fortune, as Klopp rightly referenced afterwards when asked if they now feel “fated” to win the league.

“I don’t go that far but if you go through the season of other teams, you will find these things as well,” the German argued. “For all the points we have now, we work really hard. It is not important when you score but what it is on the scoresheet afterwards. Momentum is not a coincidence, it is something you take, you keep and you use.”

And this is the deeper point to all this, beyond the winning of the three points. These moments of fortune don’t come out of nothing or coincidence. They came out of Liverpool’s persistence, of doing their part.

Hugo Lloris’ error still came from a late siege, of the type that are also intrinsic parts of any title race, and that make such moments and slips more likely.

Liverpool are back on top the Premier League (AFP/Getty)

It wasn’t the only example of this either. There was also massive luck to Moussa Sissoko’s miss, in the sense Liverpool were fortunate that he so bottled a huge chance that really should have been taken, but that didn’t happen in a vacuum either.

It was greatly influenced by Virgil van Dijk’s inspired defending. In an almost impossible situation, where he was outnumbered two to one, he still did enough through his perfect positioning to play on the doubt already visible in Sissoko and cause him to second-guess the surge. It was again that combination of application and luck, to make moments of real consequence.

This is why Klopp was right to say this is a “championship of the will”, even if highly focused will occasionally requires the wonders of blind luck. It’s about at least putting yourself there.

Hugo Lloris made a disastrous late error (EPA)

Liverpool have now temporarily put themselves top, and that is all the more credible here given they have come through a serious wobble where releases like that last-minute winner were so frustratingly beyond them. They certainly weren’t enjoying such moments in that February run of draws and weren’t enjoying those matches much at all. They have, however, forced their way through that. And they forced a way through on Sunday.

What is really important now is the effect of it. It is the sort of moment that can energise a team, and restore cohesion and application if they had been missing.

And there were spells in this game where such qualities felt missing. Liverpool were often sloppy and occasionally shapeless. But they came through it. They forced their own luck.

That, out of Klopp's stated 500,000, is often the best way to win a match. It may well have the best effect.